Book Review: The Contagious Catholic by Marcel LeJeune
This is the book for when you want a clear, unequivocal, distraction-free walk through the central process of relationship-based evangelization.
This is a quick review of Marcel LeJeune’s excellent book The Contagious Catholic: The Art of Practical Evangelization (Ascension Press, 2020).
What’s inside: The book is a compact, reader-friendly seminar in relationship-based evangelism.
Beginning and ending chapters contain a variety of timely reminders on what is and isn’t evangelization, and why it matters (See: Eternal Perdition, Command from the Lord, Love of Neighbor); the interior chapters work through the details of how the process works.
In my paraphrase, here’s the cycle of spiritual multiplication:
You experience a personal conversion, becoming (or recommitting as) a disciple of Jesus Christ. As a result, you wish to share Him with others.
You grow in your own faith by finding mentors who will teach you, challenge you, and hold you accountable.
You pray for those around you, and seek to form authentic friendships grounded in mutual respect.
You share your own story with others about how God has worked in your life. You extend invitations to others to discuss spiritual matters.
You explicitly invite people you know to make an intentional decision to follow Jesus Christ.
You mentor new (or newly-recommitted) disciples, with the goal of helping them in turn become evangelists who will go on to mentor Christians who will go on to become evangelists . . . and so on until the end of the age.
The Contagious Catholic is centered entirely on this process, as carried out in your normal life (at work, at home, at play), whatever your state in life might be. For clergy, parish staff, and volunteers . . . this is still the cycle and still the priority.
Each chapter has rather on-the-nose reflection questions, which makes this an easy book to use in a group setting and an appropriately-uncomfortable book if you have gotten a little too content with the status quo.
Is this the one book you need to read? Well, hello, if you’re reading this you’re probably not the kind of person who wants only one book ever. So I can recommend (and will) this other book that’s also extremely helpful. But yes, if you are tasked with picking the one book that your very-busy pastor, parish staff members, or other fellow aspiring-missionaries are going to read (and that person is going to read at most one book), then this is probably the one.
Why is Marcel LeJeune’s book the go-to for one-book readers, and not certain other very excellent books about evangelization and discipleship? Because The Contagious Catholic focuses 100% on the single most-central process of evangelization and discipleship. If you have to make hard decisions about what you are and aren’t going to read, this is where your energy needs to be.
Cover art for The Contagious Catholic: The Art of Practical Evangelization courtesy of Ascension Press.